An Etymological Dictionary of Astronomy and Astrophysics
English-French-Persian

A linear → Hermitian operator associated with a physical quantity.

→ quantum; → mechanics; → operator.

A faint object (magnitude 18.5), probably a dwarf planet, orbiting the Sun beyond Neptune in the Kuiper belt. Discovered in 2002, Quaoar is estimated to have a diameter of 1260 km and an orbital period of 287 years.

Quaoar the name of a creation deity of the Native American Tongva, located in the Los Angeles area, where the discovery was made.

Any of the hypothetical particles with spin 1/2, baryon number 1/3, and electric charge 1/3 or -2/3 that, together with their antiparticles, are believed to constitute all the elementary particles classed as baryons and mesons. Quarks are distinguished by their flavors, designated as up (u), down (d), strange (s), charm (c), bottom or beauty (b), and top or truth (t), and their colors, red, green, and blue. The key evidence for the existence of quarks came from a series of inelastic electron-nucleon scattering experiments (→ inelastic scattering) conducted between 1967 and 1973 at the Stanford Linear Accelerator Center. Other theoretical and experimental advances have confirmed this discovery, leading to the → standard model of particle physics.

Quark, coined in 1963 by the American physicist Murray Gell-Mann (1929-), who took it from a nonsense word in James Joyce's novel Finnegans Wake (1939): Three quarks for Muster Mark! // Sure he has not got much of a bark // And sure any he has it's all beside the mark.

The phenomenon wherein the → quarks are permanently bound together and can never be removed from the → hadrons they compose.

→ quark; → confinement.

A hypothetical star so dense that it is composed of degenerate quarks, a matter denser than that of a neutron star.

→ quark; → star.

A phase transition, predicted by cosmological models, to have occurred at approximately 10^-5 seconds after the Big Bang to convert a plasma of free quarks and gluons into hadron.

→ quark; → hadron; → phase; → transition.

A fourth of the Moon's period or monthly revolution around Earth. → first quarter; → last quarter.

from O.Fr. quartier, from L. quartarius "fourth part," from quartus "fourth," related to quattuor "four," cognate with Pers. câr, cahâr, as below.

Cârak "quarter," literally "fourth, a fourth part of one," from câr, contraction of cahâr, → four, + -ak, contraction of yak, yek "one." Yek "one, alone," from Mid.Pers. êwak (Proto-Iranian *aiua-ka-); O.Pers. aiva- "one, alone;" Av. aēuua- "one, alone;" cf. Skt. éka- "one, alone, single;" Gk. oios "alone, lonely;" L. unus "one;" E. one.

A plate of doubly refracting material cut parallel to the optic axis of the crystal and of such a thickness that a phase difference of 90° is introduced between the ordinary and extraordinary rays for light of a particular wavelength. → half-wave plate.

→ quarter; → wave; → plate.

An equation containing unknowns of the fourth power; the general form: ax⁴ + bx³ + cx² + dx + e = 0.

From L. quart(us) "fourth" (→ quarter) + → -ic; → equation.

hamugeš, → equation; câromân, from cârom "fourth," from câr, cahâr "four" + -om "-th" + -ik, → -ic.

In statistics, any of the four groups of a frequency distribution each containing 25% of the total number of individual observations.

From M.L. quartilis, from quart(us) "fouth" + -ilis "-ile" a suffix of adjectives expressing capability, susceptibility, liability, aptitude.

Cârakvâr, from cârak, → quarter, + -vâr suffix of similarity, size, aptitude.

One of the most abundant → minerals in the Earth's → crust. Quartz is made up of silicon dioxide (SiO₂), or → silica. It has marked → piezoelectric properties and → dielectric strength.

From Ger. Quarz "rock crystal," from M.H.G. twarc.

An compact, extragalactic object which is highly luminous and looks like a star. Their redshifts can be large and their brightness varies. Quasars have an intrinsic luminosity which can reach some 100 times that of bright galaxies. They are thought to be active galactic nuclei with a size a little larger than the solar system. The first quasar to be identified as such, in 1963, was the radio source 3C 273 at a redshift of 0.158. With its 13th magnitude, it is the optically brightest quasar as observed from Earth. Some quasars are strong radio sources.

From quas(i) + (stell)ar (object).

Setârevaš, from setâré, → star, + -vaš, → quasi-.

A prefix meaning "resembling, almost, having some, but not all of the features of."

From L. quasi "as if, as though," from qua(m)" as" + si "if."

Cunân "so, like that; just as if," from cun "how?," (Mid.Pers. cigôn "how?," cigônêh "nature, character," O.Pers/Av. ci- "what, any," collateral stem to ka- "who?, what?;" cf. Skt. ka-; Gk. po-; L. quo-; E. what, who; PIE *qwos/*qwes) + suffix ân. -vaš a suffix of similitude.

A system in which the nuclei of two colliding atoms approach each other closely for a brief lapse of time so that their electrons are arranged in atomic orbitals characteristic of a single atom with combined atomic number.

→ quasi-; → atom.

A subsystem if its intrinsic energy is large, on the average, with respect to the energy of its interaction with other portions of the → closed system.

→ quasi-; → closed; → subsystem.

In plasma physics, the theory that considers the interactions between waves and particles are of first order only. It ignores all terms of second order in the fluctuating quantities.

→ quasi-; → linear; → theory.

An asteroid moving around the Sun having the same mean motion and mean → longitude as a planet, but a different → eccentricity. The asteroid remains near the planet much like a satellite even when its distance is large enough so that it is well outside the planet's → Hill sphere. The quasi-satellite motion is one class of possible → co-orbital motions of small bodies in 1:1 mean-motion → resonance with a planet. If the quasi-satellite orbit is coplanar with the planet, then the motion is stable in the → secular approximation. When the orbits are inclined enough, an asteroid can be trapped into such a motion for a finite period of time. Earth has several quasi-satellites (mainly 3753 Cruithne, 2002 AA₂₉, 2003 YN₁₀₇), also does Venus (the only one so far discovered, 2002 VE₆₈). The possibility of such orbits was first suggested by J. Jackson (1913, MNRAS 74, 62).

The term quasi-satellite was first used by S. Mikkola & K. Innanen 1997, The Dynamical Behaviour of our Planetary System; Proceedings, p. 345); → quasi-; → satellite.

A region of the solar atmosphere where the gradient of the field line → linkage from one boundary to another is large so that the field lines can slip-run rapidly through the → plasma. The QSL results from → magnetic reconnection without → null point.

→ quasi-; → separatrix; → layer.

A model of radiative transfer that ignores forward scattering of photons; assuming forward-scattered light as un-scattered.

→ quasi-; → single; → scattering; → approximation.

Initial name of → quasars.

→ quasi-; → stellar; → object.